


The Torture of Dean Winchester

by blackat_t7t



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Blood and Gore, Dark, Gen, Graphic Description, Psychological Torture, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-16
Updated: 2011-10-16
Packaged: 2019-08-02 20:56:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16312574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackat_t7t/pseuds/blackat_t7t
Summary: The torture Dean endured in Hell wasn't just physical.





	The Torture of Dean Winchester

**Author's Note:**

> Imported from LiveJournal on 10/15/2018
> 
> Original notes:  
> Another one I've had sitting on my computer for a while. I actually wrote it the same day as [The New Puppy](http://blackat-t7t.livejournal.com/19708.html), but it felt too weird to post something so angsty the same day as major fluff.

When Dean first arrived in Hell, the physical pain was overwhelming, almost more than his mind could process. Every breath was torture to draw as blood filled his throat and lungs and threatened to drown him. Every inch of his skin screamed out in agony as it was carefully and methodically sliced, or burned, or stripped from his flesh, again, and again, and again. He was always entirely awake and aware, focused on every new bolt of pain with a crystal clear sharpness. The pain was unbearable, unbelievable, and every time he thought it was impossible to hurt more than he did at that moment, somehow the demons made it worse.  
   
After what seemed like years, Dean reached a point where he could tear his focus away from his screaming body and turn it to purely mental things. One image floated constantly in the forefront of him mind, giving him strength even as he heard his bones break and his flesh tear: the face of his brother, Sam. But eventually, the demons found a way to use that against him as well.  
   
Instead of the few happy memories that he had been focusing on, Dean found his mind forcibly turned to one of the lowest points of his life: the day Sam announced that he would be leaving the family to go to college. Dean watched as his father and Sam fought, both screaming the cruelest, most hate-filled things they could, while he stood by, powerless to stop his family tearing itself apart.  
   
Dean was forced to relive the day he drove Sam to Stanford for orientation, because their father refused to do it. He was forced to relive that awful moment of realizing just how much Sam hated the life they lead, hated everything Dean was proud to be. And he was forced to relive watching Sam turn away from him and walk inside, while every fiber of his being screamed out for Dean to stop him, but he couldn’t. Wouldn’t. It was Sam’s decision. And Dean would never take away what Sam wanted, really wanted, no matter how much it hurt Dean. It was like watching his still-beating heart being torn from his body and flung away. It was worse; Dean knew that now, because he’d watched that, felt it, a thousand times already. Nothing the demons could do to his body would ever be more painful than watching Sam walk away.  
   
The demons went back through his memories and brought up every painful instance when he and Sam had fought. The look on Sam’s face when he tried to shoot Dean after Ellicott got ahold of him. The way he smiled and said “That’s what I want you to do,” after Dean threatened to leave him on the side of the road when Sam wanted to go to California to find their father. How Meg, or the demon inside of Meg, had told him his treated Sam like luggage and should let him do what he wanted. Every little thing that had ever made Dean feel like Sam hated him was dredged up and forced in front of his face.  
   
And then they made his relive that awful night when Sam died in his arms. Made him watch as Sam’s face contorted in pain when he was stabbed, as he fell to his knees, head hanging limp. Dean ran to him, dropped to the ground, took Sam in his arms. Felt the blood soaking his shirt, realized, with a sick feeling in his stomach, the severity of the wound. Held Sam in his arms as his breaths slowed and stopped, and the blood ceased flowing and began to cool and dry against Dean’s palm.  
   
Then he woke from the memories like from a dream, and the purely physical torture was almost a relief. Until it all started up again, from the moment Sam announced that he didn’t want to be a part of his family anymore.  
   
The demons thought that showing Dean all of these things would break him, that they could shatter his mind as fully as they did his body. But they were wrong.  
   
As much as it hurt to relive those worst moments of his life, it also gave Dean strength. It reminded him how he had come to be here, strung up and gutted like an animal carcass, in the first place. He had put himself here to save Sam, to save the brother who meant more to him than life itself. He had made the deal to bring Sam back, and no matter what the demons did Dean would never regret his decision. No matter how many times he saw his beating heart hanging from his chest by bloody threads, saw his intestines spill from his body, saw Sam turn and walk away, Dean would never regret his decision.


End file.
